Kids

Lean In?

June 27, 2019 by Elizabeth Drake 3 Comments

I have never denied how busy I am or how many more hours I would like in a day.

Spouse, children, day job, writing, family…I never feel like I have enough time for everything.

When time management books tell me to cut back on my television time…I can’t tell you the last thing I watched for me. Yes, I have watched Nailed It with the kids, and I have seen waaay more than my fair share of Octonauts. But other than that, I have not watched TV or movies for myself in ages.

And now I consider whether or not I should take a more active role in my girls’ love of dance. I will never be a “dance mom”, and I will never see dance as more than an enjoyable way for them to move their bodies and get some exercise. We live in a really cold state. It’s an indoor sport. Seems like a good fit.

And they love it.

My youngest daughter was running around the house pretending to be Link from Legend of Zelda wielding her sword and shield and taking on “bad guys”.

Why, yes, she does have gamer parents. Why do you ask?

When it was time to go to her dance recital, she was singing the theme song to Dino Trucks as we got her dressed in her beautiful purple sparkly dance dress kind of like this one.

I love the variety little girls have to choose from today!

Dinotrux — Daughter’s favorite show ever.

She was so excited to be going to her dance recital, and she couldn’t wait to show us “her moves”. My little one, who is normally not a fan of the spotlight, got up on stage in front of a sold-out theater and did her best.

My oldest daughter overcame stage fright so she could dance.

Not sure I am allowed to admit this, but I am amazed how graceful and coordinated she is on stage! If you saw her off stage…

We are also blessed that we found a dance studio that truly is inclusive. The girls range in size from almost six feet tall to barely five feet. Some are thin some are not and some are very heavy. But all move together beautifully, and I love seeing the diversity on stage. I love seeing girls, of any size or shape, dancing and enjoying the freedom of movement.

Of course, now my oldest daughter wants to do “everything”.

Dance is expensive. Then, you have to drive them to class and wait for them. And she has a sister who will want to do “everything” with her.

As we’re trying to figure out transportation, which classes we can actually do, how many is “too many”, etc, I am also asking myself if I should be more involved.

Should I volunteer for things? If this is really going to be important to my daughters, how much should I get involved?

Do I want to?

Well, no.

Do I want to doing something with my girls that’s important to them?

Of course.

I am just not sure how all of this works. What the right path is.

It’s all new territory to me. And the parenting books forgot to mention this back when we were trying to learn all about the joys and pitfalls of children.

Tired of Feeling Bad for Being a Working Mom

May 23, 2019 by Elizabeth Drake

Can you tell I am trying to figure out summer care, dance class schedules, and school transportation?

There are plenty of articles out there answering why people are choosing to not have children at all or are having far fewer than they would like.

I did choose to have them even with several of these misgivings, and I am tired of feeling bad for doing so while being a working mom.

I am also tired of a society designed around having one parent that stays at home if you do have children.

Yeah, those free Tuesday morning dance camp e-mails always get a scowl.

Don’t believe that the system isn’t designed for working parents? I know, it can be hard to believe that in 2019 the school system can still think it’s 1953, so here are some of my challenges.

My daughter is in school for a total of seven hours a day. That includes her lunchtime and recess.

Seven.

I have to work eight for it to be a full day, and my lunchtime is not considered part of my workday. That means even with my relatively short 20 minute commute, I am almost three hours short on the amount of time she’s in school versus the amount of time I am at work or traveling to and from work.

So, I pay for “wrap-around” care. On top of daycare for my youngest, and my youngest’s daycare costs us the equivalent of having a second mortgage payment each month.

did-you-sign-me-up-for-daycare-yes-what-did-35755895.png — College in my state is cheaper.

And the article linked above wonders why people think daycare is too expensive.

Of course, you could stay home. Always an option. But as many other articles have noted, you’re paying a premium for that both in terms of total lifetime earnings, but also in terms of promotion and advancement opportunities. Being “mommy tracked” in my industry is a career-limiting-move.

And, frankly, I love my kids. I would do almost anything for them, but I suck at dealing with kids. I have no training in it, and even now, I regularly feel sorry for my kids that they got stuck with me instead of someone that has a clue how to raise them.

Do you know how many parenting books I read?

Do you know how many were helpful?

Yeah, none. Because as I learned, kids don’t follow manuals.

They eventually outgrow daycare, so you’re “just” paying for the wrap-around care. Then there’s the extracurricular activities. Back when I was a kid, these were truly “extra”. Now, the amount of pressure to have your kid in everything is amazing.

What do you mean your child isn’t in soccer, ballet, basketball, volleyball, and taking piano lessons?!? What kind of parent are you?

One that works.

All of these extra-curricular activities require transportation to and from them (not to mention the additional cost). Because of course I can leave work at 3pm to fetch my daughter and have her to dance class before 4pm. /end sarcasm.

And I am not alone. In families with both parents still living together, almost 50% are dual income households.

And driving their kids places is a significant stressor.

I need a self-driving car just to cart my daughter to and from her activities. Which, I limited her to two because I truly believe kids need time to play and engage their imagination.

There’s that writer in me.

Financial Sacrifices For Kids

March 7, 2019 by Elizabeth Drake

I work with numbers for my day job, so sometimes, it bleeds over into other things. Like when I think of my children.

I love my children, I truly do. But sometimes, I feel selfish for having them. I feel like children are really only for the very wealthy or those willing to make a lot of sacrifices for them.

Once, there wasn’t the same choice about having children. You either abstained entirely, or you had the number of children you did. And that was that.

Now, children are a choice. At least in my part of the world they are.

And children are expensive.

You either have to quit working (loss of an income) or pay for childcare. Children under two years old cost approximately $300 per week for care in my area. Over two and it slowly edges down each year to approximately $225 per week right before they start kindergarten.

Unless you are fortunate enough to have parent willing to watch your children, this is going to be a significant expense during their younger years.

Then comes after-school care, sports, trips to Washington DC, etc. Also, remember you are still going to be paying for summer care. Here in the US, that’s twelve weeks of care, not counting the four weeks of holidays sprinkled throughout the rest of the year.

Care is expensive.

This is by far our largest expense, and while it is brutal, I as a parent, I make it so that my kids get the care they deserve. These younger years are so important.

Still working on sacrificing my video game, though.

GamerParents — Super Smash Brothers is awesome!

Finally, they turn eighteen, and you have no more legal obligation or control over them. They are an adult and you hope and pray you have done your job and raised a good person.

Except, that’s when they hit you with one of the biggest bills yet.

College.

Can you tell I recently got my Edvest statement? I’ve been saving for each of my children since they had a social security number for me to open an account in their name, and I still don’t have enough for saved for either of them to pay for a single year at a state school.

And it baffles me why parents are expected to pay for their kids’ college at this point.

Not a little additional something. Not just lodging or food. The whole, entire thing.

How is it that a separate, legal adult’s financial aid is based on their parent’s income? A separate, legal adult whose parents can’t see their grades or medical history? Can’t even see their kids finances because their child is an adult?

Shouldn’t financial aid be based on the adult applying for admission’s income at the time? Or the future income that they expect to earn from whatever degree they’re seeking?

Besides, as many people will tell you, their parents income is no barometer for their parents willingness to spend that income on their children’s schooling. Particularly when that schooling costs more than a new car each year.

Especially as many parents are now being asked to pay that at the same time the parents are approaching retirement themselves.

I have several women in my department who are working solely to help put their kids through school. These kids are lucky. One of the people in my department has a mountain of debt because she couldn’t get any financial aid because of her parents’ income, but they wouldn’t pay anything for her school once she turned eighteen.

We’ve chosen to buy a much smaller house and own our cars much longer just to afford daycare. We also opened college savings accounts for our daughters as soon as they were born. This seems ludicrous to me. How is it that so much is being dedicated to these handful of years of schooling? Why are they so expensive? Is the payback really there at this price?

By the time my daughters get to be college age, would they be better off working for a couple of years and taking the $250,000 a four year degree would cost them and starting their own business?

Interesting thing is I learned more working (and getting paid) my first year in the Big 4 than I did all four years at a very reputable college.

But I couldn’t have gotten that job without the degree and mountain of debt that came with it.

My spouse and I had a long talk about it, and we will save what we can for our children. But in the end, it will have to be their choice and their cost.

They will get what is in their savings account. When that is gone, the rest will be on them.

If they choose to take advanced placement classes in high school, and take those classes seriously, we won’t ask them to work. Placing well on those exams will be worth far more to them than what they would make at a part time job.

It’s a really hard decision, but I see no other way. We can only give them so much, sacrifice so much. We love them dearly, but it does drive home the point that we have a very broken education system when parents have to spend a lifetime saving and it’s still not enough.

Tidying Up

February 14, 2019 by Elizabeth Drake

A co-worker recommended I check out the show Tidying Up with Marie Kondo. It’s on Netflix, so I have access to it, and it’s something the kids can watch even if they don’t want to.

So all of our kids’ rooms can look like this.

So, I popped it on one Friday night when I was feeling stressed and not really up to anything too gripping, but I also wanted a bit of something on while I went about the evening.

It was an interesting take on tidying.

This isn’t the kind of show you watch for hugely dramatic results. But it does have some interesting lessons.

If you aren’t already familiar, the concept starts with piling like things together then deciding what to keep based on what “sparks joy”.

This is supposed to be done mostly alone so family biases don’t sway your perception of joy. Also, you are supposed to touch things, to let yourself feel the joy.

Deceptively simple.

This forces people to often confront mountains of possessions, particularly clothes, as you round up all like things in the entire house and pile them together. Makes me cringe a little as I know I also own too many clothes.

books-768426_640 — Good thing my books are on my Kindle or my house would look like this.

It also addresses the concept of sunk cost and helps people get past it.

I deal with this from time to time in my day job. For example, a machine we bought is operating sub optimally. When we evaluate replacing it, we do not look at the purchase price of that machine. We look at the cost of the new alternatives before us and what each of those alternatives will give us for the cost of the alternative.

If we put this into practice in our personal life, we should ignore the $500 price tag on the pair of shoes that hurt our feet and we never wear. Instead, we should be asking ourselves if those shoes “spark joy”. If they don’t (and it’s highly doubtful they do), out they go!

envy2 — Because those were never comfortable.

Perhaps more interesting is how the tidying process deals with the way we value our possessions as part of ourselves. This manifests in a difficult to get rid of things because they mean more to us simply because they are our things. For example, there have been studies done showing that if there are two identical mugs, and one mug is ours, we put more value on that mug.

This method deals with overcoming that value so we can part with things in a beautiful and graceful way.

Rather than simply tossing the things out, you tell them goodbye and thank them for their service. You then wish them well on their journey.

Maybe it sounds a little hokey written down here, but I watched her tell people to be gentle with things that were meaningful. To say their goodbyes. It felt kind and accepting of the emotion attached.

Overall, the show is interesting, but I don’t have the six months recommended to tidy my home, not with everything else going on. Still, the show did inspire me to tackle a small corner of my closet. I have a feeling if you are good at thrifting, now would be a spectacular time to be shopping!

I never thought of myself as much of a saver, but I will say that thanking something and saying goodbye, then carefully folding it up to send it on its journey made it easier to say goodbye to the next item and the next item after that.

I didn’t need the emotional fortitude to part part with half my dress pants after the dress code change at work six months ago, but I still had the bathrobes I’d worn when I had infants to nurse. I haven’t worn them in over five years, but for some reason, it was still hard to say goodbye.

But I thanked them and wished them well on their way.

And I feel better for it.

There Was an Incident

August 2, 2018 by Elizabeth Drake

There was an incident.

Involved a small child. A 25lb cat. A nasty-tasting bottle of carbonated water. And an iMac.

The Apple Care specialists have a three day wait list.

I am really starting to think I’m being haunted by technology ghosts.

Not sure if I need to make offerings to Steve Jobs or Bill Gates or both. Probably both, and I hear they both accept plastic.

An Introvert’s Nightmare

July 3, 2018 by Elizabeth Drake

As I may or may not have said, my older daughter takes dance. My younger daughter has been begging for months to go to dance class.

So, I signed her up for the summer session at the same time as her sister.

Unfortunately the time slot meant a race across town from work to pick up the girls, and a race back across town to get to the studio, get them changed into their outfits and ready on time.

But, I figured I could do it, and it would let the younger child enjoy the class she wanted. So, I packed granola bars for the girls to eat in the car, and I packed up all of their dance stuff into their dance bag and put it in my car the night before so I wouldn’t forget.

drive — Too much truth for too many parents.

Then came the first day. I left work on time, but I went to two wrong doors before finding where my daughter is let out from her summer school program.

Okay, so I’m running five minutes late. No big deal as I had a fifteen minute cushion.

I got to pick up my second daughter about two minutes away. But the road construction has intensified, and traffic is backed up almost two miles from the red light. I am now starting to panic. It takes ten minutes to go a distance that should have taken no more than two. We’re now cutting it close.

I go to pick up the my younger daughter, and my older daughter starts making a scene. Of course she does. She wants to be the center of attention, and here’s a new audience. Then the younger child starts ripping out her ponytail, a ponytail she needs for dance class, and I failed to bring a second ponytail holder if she breaks this one.

So, amid tears, anger and frustration, I all but drag them back out to the car.

Where the chocolate chips in the granola bars have melted from the heat. I grit my teeth, give them to the girls anyway, knowing I’ll have a mess to clean at the dance studio.

We get in the car and head across town. We are now cutting it close. There will be less than five minutes to get the older daughter changed for her class.

Deep breath. I can do this.

Until I get stuck behind someone doing five under the speed limit, which results in me getting all five red lights between daycare and the dance studio red.

We walk in the door and a hurry the girls to the changing room. The older one is having trouble changing because we’re rushing, so I stop to help her. She’s changed and ready to go just as dance class starts.

Okay. I’m calling it a success.

Now for child two.

She has started to put on her tights as the older one got ready, but she is jamming her feet in. Tights are evil, even for adults, and wrangling a preschooler into them is torture. But we do…And then I realize she hadn’t taken off her shorts.

ballet-2789432_640 — Somehow, someone got them in tights AND shoes.

Gritting my teeth as people keep coming in and out of the changing room and leaving the door open, I help her take off the tights, get her shorts off, get the tights and leotard back on.

She hates the tights and wants them off. I manage to get her tap shoes on her, and we head back out to the waiting room. Yes, all the “dance moms” are giving me snide looks, but a few more minutes and the second child will be in dance class and I can ignore them while I read my book.

Dance class starts, and I try to walk her to the door, but she won’t let go of my leg. She screams and cries. As I’ve learned from preschool, I deposit her in the room and walk back to the waiting room.

Only she doesn’t stop.

After fifteen minutes, the dance instructor brings her back out to me. Where she proceeds to scream and cry for the entire rest of her sister’s class.

I was so embarrassed and mortified I think I managed to turn new shades of red. Here I am, being stared at with condescension and derision, as my child screams. She even tries throwing herself to the floor a few times. I can’t escape because I can’t leave the older one there alone. I can’t go outside because it’s too hot to sit in the car and pouring down rain.

All I can do is count down the minutes until the older child is done with class. Until I can escape.

I have no idea what came over my daughter. No idea why she wouldn’t go play with the parachute, or do froggy jumps, or all the other fun things they were doing in class. No idea why she begged to take this class for months. And frustrated beyond words that I paid for the class, tap shoes, ballet shoes, tights and leotards for her to attend.

But mostly, I never want to show my face in that dance studio again.

Kids

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